Alice Notley died in Paris a fraction over a week ago. Strange and not strange, discovering a poet days after their death. A prolific writer, Notley authored over 40 books of poetry. Her work defies genre or classification. She married poets. Birthed poets. And I, a fledgling poet, just now heard her name.
This will continue to happen throughout my life. And someday, I too will die, and maybe a poet or two after me will hear about my name for the first time and read a collection or two I wrote and also think about dying in Paris, or think about their fathers, and in that way, humans both dead and alive will continue to commune with the other and humanity will keep trying to find meaning in living and maybe—just maybe—we do.
Sometimes I wonder if I'm hiding out in Santa Barbara. I truly love it here but I was grown with the constitution that life shouldn't be lived without some kind of constant pain, and living here—among the uber wealthy—is quite the mindfuck at times. Instead of being thankful life that isn't as hard as you're used to, one starts to think it's not as easy for you as it appears to be for others.
How effortless it is to forget the rest of the world lives nothing like I do, here—even seaside towns in Spain are nothing like this. And I've become used to it, like the pain of a chronic injury, believing I deserve not only what I have, but constantly more.
There is a man who walks my neighborhood in the morning. I assume he's unhoused. I don't know where he comes from or where he's going or what's in the bags he carries. Always two plastic bags, one in each hand. And it's always in the same 15-minute window, between 6:45-7:00 AM. And he never looks up and never speaks and he doesn't like to share a narrow sidewalk, so he'll move to the road. He is older than me, but he's always looking to the ground like me.
Most of Santa Barbara will look away or complain on NextDoor. I'm trying to work up the courage to speak to him and ask him where he's been, where he's going. It feels important somehow. I don't know.
